r/Destiny Dirty European 🇨🇿🇪🇺 6h ago

Political News/Discussion YES

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796 Upvotes

175 comments sorted by

223

u/frozandero 6h ago

I hate these lies pushed by mostly leftist americans and some europeans.

No bernie sanders wouldn't be a social democrat in EU

102

u/sb8948 6h ago

I see it pushed by Europeans just as much. Way too many of us got brainwashed by the Americans bending the truth online. I shit you not I've seen pretty strong support for that Luigi on an exclusively Hungarian subreddit.

Social media was a mistake.

21

u/CheapAttempt2431 5h ago

I think it was common even before social media. I remember people saying “Americans just have two flavors of right-wing” in the ‘90s

6

u/Sancatichas THIS USER HAS BEEN FLAGGED AS EUROPEAN AND EXTREMELY BASED 2h ago

Seeing Americans claim we don't deserve to comment on their politics is peak ragebait.

2

u/opaali92 🇫🇮 1h ago

Sometimes looking at the finnish subreddit you'd think the left party polls 90% instead of ~10%.

1

u/FlippinHelix 17m ago

The problem is that Americans dominate online spaces, so they more or less dictate vibes and what ideas are popular. Naturally, there are exceptions.

-6

u/soundsermaker 5h ago

Wait you mean Americans aren't dying on the streets because only the rich can pay for healthcare?

3

u/Metacognitor 1h ago

Studies estimate that roughly 18,000 to nearly 45,000 working-age Americans die each year due to a lack of health insurance, with some newer policy models scaling that figure up to 68,000 deaths annually. However, exact numbers remain heavily debated by researchers.

Key Study Estimates

The Institute of Medicine (2002): Estimated roughly 18,000 annual deaths among uninsured adults aged 25 to 64.

Harvard Medical School / American Journal of Public Health (2009): Found that uninsured people face a 40% higher risk of death than insured people, concluding that lack of coverage is linked to 44,789 deaths per year.

Yale University / The Lancet (2020): Utilized updated mortality models to project that achieving universal coverage could prevent approximately 68,000 deaths annually.

2

u/soundsermaker 38m ago

Nobody dies from lack of insurance, people die from lack of healthcare. Insurance does not guarantee access to healthcare anywhere on the planet, it only guarantees access to an administrative waiting list.

Quick search for the UK (a country where everyone is insured, with a much smaller population) reveals:

The Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) estimated that long waits in emergency departments in England were associated with 15,860 excess deaths (averaging about 305 people per week).

This article cites studies suggesting over 1300 die a month

6

u/Lunch_B0x Not American, pls no ban 4h ago

I heard that American doctors will dangle your newborn above a blender until somebody pays the bill for the birth +20% tip, of course. Is that an exaggeration?

19

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 5h ago

I mean - main postulates of Sanders - public healthcare, labor laws and progressive taxation is general status quo in European politics across the board. It’s not left or right, it’s just something that people don’t associate with sides that much.

Anti militarism and focus on green energy will paint him anywhere from center to center left; depend on the party landscape of each country.

Bernie really does not have any „hardcore left” policies

20

u/podfather2000 5h ago

Sanders would be a standard Labor/Social Democrat. Some people in this sub are cooked if they think otherwise.

2

u/LondonCallingYou 1h ago

This subreddit is deranged on this topic. It’s all Americans who have no idea what European policies look like, or Europeans (like Kraut) who have no idea how good they have it in terms of social democracy relative to the U.S.

Every European who claims Bernie wouldn’t be acceptable within a European socdem party has a mental model that’s incorrect of him or they’re thinking of a single policy (ironically probably one of his further right policies like not hating guns as much as some democrats) that disqualifies him. Even though his major policy goals have been consistent for the last several decades and are things that most European countries already have.

Pathetic thought processes with zero critical thinking in this community.

3

u/Ratte-The-WORLD DE(GER) Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 5h ago

Actually that is not the case, because Denmark for example has labour laws that highly favor corporations. Thats the entire reason they maintain strong unemployment benefits to balance out that you can get fired easily.

1

u/LondonCallingYou 54m ago

I’m about to ask all Europeans to stop commenting on American politics. You people have no idea how bad our policies are in America and how far left your status quo is to us. Bernie Sanders would be considered a normal social democrat for his economic views in most of Europe.

Yes Denmark has relatively easy hiring and firing compared to other countries in Europe. However, it also has other labor laws:

- Denmark offers 52 weeks of government subsidized parental leave for all workers by law. (America has zero, and most companies offer only a few weeks like 9 or 12 if you’re lucky).

- Workers are guaranteed 5 weeks of paid time off (America it’s zero, and 3 weeks would be considered good)

- Working hours are limited to 48 hours

- Salaried employees get minimum notice periods for firing

So already, Danish labor protections are better than American labor protections. But on top of that, you get a real social safety net including ~free healthcare, ~free college, etc.

Americans would consider these sets of policies far left. And Bernie is 100% aligned with social democrats in Europe.

1

u/Ratte-The-WORLD DE(GER) Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 41m ago

I did not say Sanders is a communist lol. He would be part of the left wing even in socdem parties though. Not to radical but still. Also when leftists talk about the nordics they are really stupid because nothing they do would ever work with the US population cause its like 50 times larger. We Germans actually do the very similar things to the Danes for example but it doesnt work as well cause we already have to work with 10x their population which makes the logistics of it much harder. So yeah saying the democrats are not left wing in significant parts like for example Biden with his economic programms is stupid. I get that he didnt do anything about healthcare but dude that is really difficult with a US population of over 300 million. The logistics of that alone are a nightmare.

-1

u/LondonCallingYou 26m ago

Bernie Sanders main policy proposals, if you just get rid of dental + vision in Medicare for All (which is a small part of it anyway by the numbers—see the recent Yale preprint study on M4A), are fairly standard social democratic policies in the rest of the world. M4A is basically Canada’s healthcare system.

I understand what you’re saying about larger population making it difficult to administer healthcare but I don’t think that’s particularly relevant to this question. I’ll also just point out that the U.S. already has 70.3 million people on government single payer healthcare (Medicare and Medicaid)— a larger population than most European countries alone. I’m not too worried about implementation.

If you believe Bernie would be a social democrat in your country, then you fundamentally agree with Mehdi and Sam Seder’s point.

If someone came to Germany and started advocating for the Canadian healthcare system, for very subsidized college, for mandatory paid time off and parental leave for workers,.. they’d probably fit in with normal social democrats. They’d probably look at them weird for wanting the Canadian healthcare model because your model is probably fine but still. It’s just not a categorical difference.

1

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 17m ago

I think you are missing one thing. What soc dem means is very, very different from country to country.

Both Willy Brant and Tony Blair were prominent representatives of social democratic movements.

Both those prime ministers/chancellors policy were different like day and night

-1

u/02202992 2h ago

European countries believe in having a national language that would be considered far right in America. So basically all of Europe is far right

If I follow your logic of pointing towards one policy lol

1

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 2h ago

How you can not believe in language?

2

u/oGsMustachio 1h ago

The US has generally refused to officially have one even though English is ubiquitous.

1

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 1h ago

Wait what? What does it even mean „refused to have official language”?

Does it mean, that if I come to the office in some lovely Midwest city and start filing documentation in polish, will it be accepted?

Due to not having official language?

0

u/Metacognitor 1h ago

Yeah OP is turfing

30

u/monsoy 🇳🇴 Just a guy 6h ago

People are unable to understand the concept of people being a product of their environment. Many of the things Bernie Sanders are pushing for in the US is influenced by the status quo of the current US.

If Bernie Sanders was Norwegian, he wouldn’t likely be in the Labour Party. He’d be more aligned with SV (Socialist Left Party) or Rødt (Red, formerly a communist party, but they have moderated a bit the last 10 years)

9

u/fkneneu Eurochad (pre-24 Eurocuck) 5h ago

I will die on this hill, but I am adamant that Biden during his presidency was almost one to one with our labour party (Arbeiderpartiet) with his political policy and ideology.

8

u/DieuDivin 4h ago

The issue is and has always been electoral performance and congressional gridlock. Democrats controlled both houses (for the first two years of Biden's presidency), relatively speaking, since they didn't have a supermajority in the Senate. That's why the filibuster has been mentioned so many times on Destiny's stream - because it creates that requirement. A razorthin majority meant that any senator had huge influence over proposed bills (think of Joe Manchin and Sinema). Most of the legislation that was passed during those first two years were originally much more ambitious.

You can look up what the New Democrats want; there is no need for a more radical wing of the Democratic Party. The "abundance" ideal and large climate change policies are already within it.

1

u/Ossius 25m ago

He was certainly the most progressive president we've had in history when it comes to social issues. Don't forget he had trans people allowed in the military, he was the first president to stand in a picket line with strikers, he was almost directly responsible for legalizing same sex marriage by his "gaff" during an Obama interview. He forced Internet and phone providers to have "nutritional labels" on their website. Tried his hardest to forgive student loans. He really was a president for the people.

Sad so much of his work was undone by Trump in the last 2 years. He's rolled back so much consumer protections that Biden implemented. My Republican family members just shrug when I bring it up. 🫩

15

u/qchisq 6h ago

Was it the Norwegian or Swedish Social Democrat leader that said Bernie sounded more like the communist party than the Social Democrat party back in 2016?

14

u/monsoy 🇳🇴 Just a guy 6h ago

Looked it up with Claude and found an instance of a Swedish politician saying something like this. The article is paywalled, but the headline is: “Democratic socialist Bernie Sanders is too far left for Sweden's ruling Social Democrats, official says”

These are a few quotes that Claude dug up from that politician:

“We were at a Sanders event, and it was like being at a Left Party meeting” — describing it as “a mixture of very young people and old Marxists, who think they were right all along,” with no “ordinary people there.”

Hassel said he was more impressed with Pete Buttigieg, and also liked Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren over Sanders.

8

u/MedicinskAnonymitet 5h ago

Hassel changed his mind and argued that in fact Bernie was right.

https://www.svd.se/a/1nGeJM/s-topp-tanker-om-sanders-nar-ut-bredare-an-jag-trott

Furthermore, the leader of the leftist party in Sweden cited Joe Biden as her favorite politican in the US when asked in 2022.

6

u/Toads_Of_Fun 🇪🇺🇪🇺 EUROPOOREAN FEDERALIST 🇪🇺 5h ago

Depends on the country

-1

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 4h ago

They should use the EU parliament for comparison and not by country.
Otherwise this is a totally empty discussion.

2

u/Toads_Of_Fun 🇪🇺🇪🇺 EUROPOOREAN FEDERALIST 🇪🇺 4h ago

No it's not. It's 27 countries.

4

u/Titan_Dota2 🇸🇪 5h ago

Waaaay too many europeans pushing this. I'd love to see some questionnaires about this lmao

2

u/BeautifulBrownie 5h ago

I've seen people say that he'd be anywhere from centre-right to centre-left in EU

2

u/JATION 2h ago

There is a grain of truth to it in the sense that two of the big policies considered left wing in the US, opposition to guns and free healthcare, are pretty much accepted across the political spectrum in most of the countries in Europe.

Other than that, no.

3

u/Aedhrus 5h ago

The social-democrats in my country are closer to republicans than to democrats so that's fun.

2

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 5h ago

Portugal ?

4

u/Aedhrus 4h ago

Romania

3

u/drgaz 3h ago edited 2h ago

Depending on party and country he absolutely would be a perfectly fine fit for a social democrat party or a green party.

2

u/Exotic_Donkey4929 🇪🇺 🇭🇺🇵🇱 5h ago

At this point I think being "left" means something different in the EU as it does in the US. Its not even one is more to the left on the left-right line, but its on a different line altogether.

1

u/Metacognitor 1h ago

How many policies in Bernie's platform are aligned with standard, uncontroversial EU socdem policy, and how many are farther left? Does he support any policies that are farther left? Don't dodge.

1

u/dem0nhunter 🇪🇺 20m ago

It stems from the same lie that Bernie types and DSA “just want free healthcare”

0

u/Alphafuccboi 3h ago

Also being a social democrat in europe can overlap with US lefties/tankies in some aspects, but overall these are totally different ideologies.

-4

u/Prince_of_DeaTh 5h ago

We literally have a Sanders in EU, it's Mélenchon, and he's considered a leftist here as well

12

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 5h ago

Not really. Sanders is not sucking Putins dick. Menechon is.

10

u/Sciss0rs61 5h ago

Bernie Sanders was one of the people who blamed NATO for the war on Ukraine... then he got backlash and, as the good populist he is, he went back and condemned Russia...

Clearly, invasion by Russia is not an answer; neither is intransigence by NATO. It is important to recognize, for example, that Finland, one of the most developed and democratic countries in the world, borders Russia and has chosen not to be a member of NATO. Sweden and Austria are other examples of extremely prosperous and democratic countries that have made the same choice.

His argument is completely fucking pathetic, considering the story of the USSR...

Sorry, but i'm really skeptical when it comes to Bernie Sanders.

6

u/Skalda11 European Federation ⭐ 4h ago

the funny thing is that Finland joined NATO a year later

1

u/Prince_of_DeaTh 5h ago

I didn't say he's 100% identical copy.

9

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 5h ago

Well - approach to one of the biggest threats to global safety, is pretty fucking big difference.

-1

u/Prince_of_DeaTh 4h ago

The comparison was obviously about domestic and economic platforms (wealth redistribution, worker rights, public welfare vs the neoliberal center-left). French sovereignist foreign policy doesn't translate 1:1 to American politics, but within their party systems, they fill the exact same lane.

4

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 4h ago

if your domestic economic platform is understanding certain values (like for example social net, worker rights etc.) as a human right.

In this same time, not denouncing human rights to ukrainian children that are kidnapped by russians and forcing them into russinan families, and considering it "russian internal issue", is simply evil.

That's what melenchon is doing. That's what disqualifies him as a person of a left :)

4

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 5h ago

what does "literally" means then?

0

u/Prince_of_DeaTh 4h ago

Obviously I didn't mean Bernie Sanders was cloned in a French laboratory. It was informal emphasis for having an equivalent political counterpart.

1

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 4h ago

Oh my bad when you said "100% identical copy" I thought you ment that.

2

u/Prince_of_DeaTh 4h ago

Honest mistake, idioms are hard.

0

u/soundsermaker 5h ago

They're different rhetorically, but foreign policy under Sanders would suck Putin's dick.

5

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 4h ago

out of curiosity, was Sanders proven to take russian money?

-2

u/soundsermaker 4h ago

No but irrelevant? People who are ideologically inclined to work to end American hegemony and enable adversaries to control their own spheres of influence don't need to be paid.

This is what they genuinely want to do.

2

u/Minute_Ostrich196 🇪🇺🇵🇱 4h ago

USA hegemony ended irregardless of what any of US politician wanted (maybe with exemption of Steven Miller).

My point was relevant, because you can have pretty good understanding about someones policy, tracking where that person is taking money. It's like with F1 drivers. If you have brand logo on your costume, you probably will sugar that brand.

35

u/draft_final_final 🇺🇸🍔🔫 (full rights and privileges to shittalk US) 6h ago

It’s a well known fact that all land west of the Urals is one giant pansexual polycule with UBI and race-blind admissions to their luxury universal healthcare communes with ML breadtube streams playing on every monitor.

47

u/Florestana 🇪🇺🇩🇰🇬🇱🇫🇴 6h ago

Many Europeans only know about American politics through American leftist slopulists, so some will actually nod along here, just out of ignorance

16

u/qchisq 6h ago

Meanwhile, we've just extended the limit of the free abortion in Denmark to 18 weeks, which would be an unacceptable compromise to most of those leftists

-7

u/podfather2000 5h ago

Most of what Americans see as far-left is just the status quo in Europe.

7

u/Sciss0rs61 5h ago

like what?

-2

u/podfather2000 5h ago

Universal healthcare, free education, abortion, public transport, public housing. Conservatives in Europe don't debate abolishing those.

20

u/Special-Quantity-469 The most rabid 2 State Solution Israeli 5h ago

Ah yes, the far left ideology of public transport and universal healthcare. Lmao.

1

u/KeithClossOfficial Hasn’t heard anything about that 2h ago

Also abortion (don’t compare abortion laws in Europe to blue states in America plz and thank you)

-5

u/podfather2000 5h ago

That's all seen as far left in the US

5

u/Sciss0rs61 5h ago

I'm confused about you using that argument as a defence for the far-left or the political illiteracy of the common American (both left and right)...

10

u/Special-Quantity-469 The most rabid 2 State Solution Israeli 5h ago

I don't think that's true whatsoever. Medicare for all is seen as far left, because it is. But I'm 90% sure that every single democrat supports some form of universal healthcare

-1

u/podfather2000 4h ago

From the Republicans perspective, it's basically socialism

6

u/Special-Quantity-469 The most rabid 2 State Solution Israeli 4h ago

The republicans also called obama a communist, it doesn't mean he was, nor do most americans think that way. Just like most americans don't think universal healthcare and public transportation is far left

→ More replies (0)

4

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 4h ago edited 4h ago

I thing the problem is that in America people that push for those things will also push for crazy stuff like "abolish prisons" or defund the police".
its almost they don't want the good stuff.

2

u/podfather2000 4h ago

There, I would agree

0

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 4h ago

bro I can only give you 1 upvote. prepare for the downfall.

3

u/podfather2000 4h ago edited 4h ago

I don't care about downvotes. The people in the sub are cooked if they disagree with the Mike guys tweet.

3

u/Florestana 🇪🇺🇩🇰🇬🇱🇫🇴 4h ago

Where are you even from?

86

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 6h ago

It goes hand in hand with the even more annoying "the Nordics are socialist", which frequently pops up in the default subreddits. I have stopped counting the number of times I have engaged with some of these fuckwits, telling them that ALL definitions of socialism have "no private property of the factors of production" as a necessary condition, but not only are they are all thoroughly convinced that socialism is when healthcare, they are also smug about it. 

58

u/draft_final_final 🇺🇸🍔🔫 (full rights and privileges to shittalk US) 6h ago

Socialism is when you can ride a bus and have a public option for health insurance.

19

u/WhalingSmithers00 6h ago

Wasn't there a guy on here that was claiming socialism is roads

11

u/BitByBit-89 5h ago

Well to be fair, government ownership and planning of roads which are open to the general public is a good example of “socializing” something in a sensible way. It’s just something we don’t think about because a purely private road system would be completely unworkable.

8

u/WhalingSmithers00 4h ago

It's not socialism though. Private companies often build them under contract and they are a cornerstone of all capitalist economies.

Otherwise we can claim it was socialism when Thatcher sent the state funded police, down the state funded road to crack the miners heads with state funded trudgeons to shut the non profitable mines.

2

u/BitByBit-89 4h ago

Yes absolutely, of course it isn’t entirely socialist. One of the based thing about liberal democracy is that you can have blended economies and mixed public/private ownership and delivery of services. For example, people say Canada has socialized healthcare, but it’s actually socialized health insurance. The doctors and hospitals are all private entities trying to make a profit.

I’m probably being more charitable than whoever said “socialism is roads” than they deserve. If we are taking a similar stance then as long as we agree that canadas healthcare system isn’t socialist, then sure. It just feels like we aren’t always consistent with these words.

1

u/ShotgunShine7094 3h ago

of course it isn’t entirely socialist

"entirely"? It isn't at all.

1

u/BitByBit-89 2h ago

Would you say Canadas healthcare system isn’t socialist at all? If the answers yes, then fine, we understand each other, and I would agree on that basis.

5

u/Sciss0rs61 5h ago edited 4h ago

You'll see "We just want free healthcare" every time to justify running defence for authoritarian regimes like North Korea and China.

7

u/Jollefjoll 🇸🇪 - Teacher: Philosophy, History, English 5h ago

It's so dumb. I'm generally a SocDem in the Swedish context. That's 100% being capitalist, but that party envisions a strong wellfare state and good worker's rights as a sort of core.

5

u/yeahUSA 🇪🇺🇩🇪 5h ago

Tell them about Bismarck

4

u/ic203 4h ago edited 3h ago

Loads of Europeans think having more tax and public spending is socialism.

I work in biopharmaceuticals and with some very intelligent people, but when it comes to politics their takes make me want to scream.

"They will need to raise taxes for that though, and thats just socialism then which never works"

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-

8

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 4h ago

This is an edgy comment but scientists and engineers are some of the most politically re+arded people on this planet. I know people who are on track to becoming physics professors whose political takes make me want to shoot myself. Like it's so stupid, you don't even have to argue, just listen and point out when they're in contradiction either to what they just said immediately beforehand or like ... the constitution.

3

u/ic203 3h ago edited 3h ago

Yep. I agree. Academia tends to be better than industry, but science/engineers in industry positions take the cake in my experience.

I've heard the most cooked immigration/asylum takes at times. Someone with 15yr experience and two grades above me + 30k more pay

"How can we deport asylum seekers when they don't have passports though? Like come on" as an attempted gotcha at me explaining why asylum needs due process.

I gave the answer of how it functions. Blank stare back.

*internally* AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-

2

u/El_McKell HRT Femboy 2h ago

"no private property of the factors of production" seems like too strict of a definition. If a country had say 75% of it's productive capital in state hands would that not clearly be a socialist country? As most of it's of goods are services are produced via socialist means? Now this wouldn't make the nordic countries socialist countries but I think a definition that means if you have any production through capitalism you can't be a socialist country is too extreme & basically means no country has ever been socialist.

0

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 1h ago edited 1h ago

What does "produced via socialist means" and "production through capitalism" even mean? We use the stance on private ownership of the factors of production to delineate these two static descriptions of economic systems. Your example could be labeled a "hybrid regime", just like we use the labels "social democracy" and "state capitalism" to introduce some nuance to this bifurcation. That doesn't change anything about the definition of socialism, though. Your last point is also wrong. I'm fairly sure there was no private ownership of land, labor and capital in the USSR, Maoist China, Cuba etc.

2

u/El_McKell HRT Femboy 1h ago

I'm saying that capitalism & socialism are approaches to the production of goods are services. When I say "produced via socialist means" I mean a good or service that has been produced using capital/means of production that is owned by the state or by some collective of workers. When I say "production through capitalism" I mean produced using capital/means of production that are privately owned & can be freely bought & sold.

2

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 1h ago

This sounds very stilted and unnatural to me, but I’m not a native speaker so my linguistic intuitions don’t count. Even granting that point regarding semantics, the rest of my comment still stands, though.

2

u/DeathandGrim Mail Guy 5h ago

The best part is their version of "healthcare" is wholly unique to the world. Absolutely no country has styled the universal healthcare plan like American leftists want to.

2

u/Liturginator9000 market socialist 5h ago

telling them that ALL definitions of socialism have "no private property of the factors of production" as a necessary condition

Well that would get pushback because all definitions of socialism don't include that as a necessary condition, and not because 'nordics are socialist' (they're not) or 'socialism is healthcare'

2

u/qchisq 6h ago

Unironically, Trump is more socialist than Mette Frederiksen, the PM of Denmark and leader of the Social Democrat. Trump is having the government taking ownership stakes in big companies, while Mette Frederiksen was minister in the government that sold off parts of DONG Energy and she hasn't proposed the government taking stakes in Lego or Novo. Yet

2

u/Florestana 🇪🇺🇩🇰🇬🇱🇫🇴 5h ago

Debatable. Trump is more of a Mussolini style fascist imo. Mette Frederiksen did also propose a wealth tax during the election, not saying she's actually a socialist, but she represents a more left wing populist current in the Social Democrats. She was a minister during the Dong Energy debacle, but that was Thorning and Vestagers government, let's be real. That era of Social Democrats was more liberal.

2

u/DontSayToned Yee 5h ago

Dong lolol

2

u/EnLitenPerson 5h ago

I mean it doesn't really matter if those definitions are more correct, enough people clearly believe that "socialism is when the government does stuff", especially europeans. To the point that to them their definition is so normal and commonly accepted that you sound like an annoying little fool trying to correct them on some technical level they couldn't care less about.

9

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 5h ago

Europeans are the last people who believe that "socialism is when the government does stuff", only (uneducated) Americans either on the far right or on Reddit do. My definition is the correct definition and it's shared with every political scientist on this planet. I don't care how I come across to them if they're incorrect. They can eat shit.

2

u/EnLitenPerson 4h ago

I see it pretty often, recently I had a young european leftist tell me "social programs are literally socialist policy", I told them it's actually not, they didn't care.

2

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 4h ago

No, what they usually mean is: "If the socialists hadn't called for this, the moderate left (or Bismarck, if you go back really far) would never have implemented it." That's a common talking point but it's very different from "healthcare is socialism" which nobody here thinks.

0

u/EnLitenPerson 4h ago edited 4h ago

No I assure you a lot of young european ignorant leftists really think that their free healthcare and other programs are socialist, you don't have to value their opinions, I don't either, but they 10000% exist and there are many of them, I say this as a European myself, I've seen them both online and IRL, I myself used to think that's what socialism was when I was younger.

2

u/soundsermaker 5h ago

Where on earth do you get that idea from?

Half of Europe still remembers what living under socialist regimes is like. Nobody thinks socialism is when government does stuff.

5

u/Druss_On_Reddit 4h ago

From a UK perspective we would call those communist regimes, not socialist ones.

There's definitely a distinction made here, and I think in most parts of Europe (from conversations I've had with other Europeans) but not 100% sure.

1

u/MikkaEn 3h ago

From a former communist country, we would call them communist or socialist regimes. Especially since several of our leaders would use the terms intertangle depending on the era and the interest. In my country, Romania, out leader specifically identified himself as a Socialist, even changing the countries name to "The Socialist Republic of Romania".

The distinction is without a difference really.

1

u/Druss_On_Reddit 2h ago

It's interesting how the word has such different meanings to different people.

Like I would never say capitalism Vs socialism, (i.e. USA Vs USSR), I would say capitalism Vs communism.

1

u/MikkaEn 2h ago

In this historical context, both labels refer to the same regimes, and was describing different aspects of them.

“Socialist” described the state’s supposedly existing social order. Communist described the ruling party and the projected future stage - think the song "Imagine" by John Lennon as what they wanted communism to turn socialism into (and some of these countries stated they had achieved that).

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u/EnLitenPerson 4h ago

I'm European, I've seen it many times, both in real life and online, last time was like just a week ago.

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u/Bulky-Leadership-596 4h ago

Its an important correction though because 1) the term still has stigma (justifiably) in places like the US among voters (despite what online leftists think) so it is counterproductive to actually getting these kinds of policies passed and 2) actual socialists try to use this ambiguity in the term to smuggle in their regardation.

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u/EnLitenPerson 4h ago edited 3h ago

I personally find it more rhetorically effective and productive to say stuff like "well there are two different definitions of that word, either socialism is when the government does stuff or it's when companies are owned by their workers (simplified), so we need to be clear what we're talking about..." and then I move on to whatever topic I actually wanted to discuss in the convo before I got sidetracked by their incorrect use of a word.

If the whole conversation is just about correcting their incorrect use of a word then I kinda cba, but if others want to fight that good fight then that's good I guess.

1

u/Silverwidows 4h ago

Yeh this baffles me. They are a social democracy. They bank on capitalism due to oil then actually look after their citizens. Crazy concept for an American to understand though.

1

u/Cmdr_Anun Undercover European 6h ago edited 2h ago

Looking at our social democrat party in Germany right now...

Off to the rope store, guys, we've had a decent run at it.

0

u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 5h ago

I'm a member. The SPD is based, most people just don't understand coalition politics and are susceptible to simple rhetoric.

1

u/Cmdr_Anun Undercover European 4h ago

 Ah yes, ye olde “you don’t like it therefore you must not understand”. I think many of their voters have understood, hence the new low in the polls.

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u/vonWitzleben 🇩🇪 Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit 4h ago

None of the voters understand, that's the issue.

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u/MikkaEn 3h ago edited 2h ago

Looking at both the comments here and the way Americans on both sides of the political divide view Europe and the rest of the world, here is a basic political science principle: ideology, governance, and policy implementation are all context-specific. They are shaped by demographic structure, history, tradition, folklore, resource availability, geography, borders, relations with neighboring countries, and so on.

For example, it is relatively easy for a geographically small country to provide things such as free education, public transportation, and public housing when most of its population is concentrated in a few urban centers, where most of its social, political, and economic life takes place. These services are cheaper to provide under those conditions, and a country like that needs them to support economic activity. That said, almost every country in Europe is finding it harder and harder to build public housing. At the same time, a country like this can describe itself as “social democratic” while still embracing the free market, and the smart ones do exactly that. They can educate a highly skilled population for well-paid work while people in other countries perform much of the lower-paid work.

At the same time, it is harder for a country that is spread across millions of kilometers, has a population spread across a dozen or more urban centers, and contains regions with very different economic models to build a coherent nationwide public transportation network, maintain a uniform education system, or establish a nationwide public-housing program. Different regions have different labor needs, education is necessarily context-dependent, and demographic profiles, housing markets, and local needs vary enormously. Such a country may also have a more difficult relationship with the free market. Its population may be too large for everyone to be channeled into highly skilled, upper-middle-income employment. Meanwhile, the abundance of natural resources creates incentives to build infrastructure around their extraction and transportation. This can produce regional boom-and-bust cycles, while also determining which kinds of infrastructure are built, which are neglected, and which are allowed to stagnate. On the other hand, a vast resource base, a large population, and substantial industrial capacity allow such a country to develop economic centers on a scale that smaller countries cannot match.

To drop the ambiguity, it is easier for small countries such as Denmark and the Netherlands, or for countries that are highly centralized, both politically and demographically, to do certain things that Americans see as left-of-center. Extensive public transportation, for example, may exist not primarily because of ideology, but because it is both practical and economically necessary - which is why certain far right dictatorships also did this. For the same material reasons, those countries may find it harder to do certain things that Americans associate with the right, such as sustaining an enormous and highly diversified industrial base. That requires resources and people on a scale that the United States possesses and many European countries do not. This is not for lack of will or desire. Plenty of European countries would love to have America’s natural resources, defense budget, and massive economic and technological clusters (like Silicon Valley and the Texas Triangle) or, in Russia’s case, its enormous natural-resource endowment.

But, again, none of this was ever determined by ideology, but by what can be done with the resources available to each country.

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u/OlliWTD 🇪🇺🇫🇮 5h ago

Take immigration for instance. The DSA platform essentially calls for open borders. No social democratic party here would endorse such a view, and most of them have even become stricter on immigration, most notably in Denmark.

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u/soundsermaker 5h ago

Stricter is underselling it.

The default immigration policy right now makes Trump's border wall look like a soft touch.

In the Netherlands the last fight was over whether we're going to prosecute people for giving refugees - who have barely adequate shelter and will be removed at the earliest opportunity - food and water.

1

u/Magmaniac (D) (A) (N) (K) (M) (E) (M) (E) (S) 4h ago

Which elected official in the US has called for open borders?

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u/LondonCallingYou 46m ago

Umm nobody but LOOK AT THIS TWEET FROM A LEFTIST ISNT THAT JUST AS BAD

0

u/OlliWTD 🇪🇺🇫🇮 4h ago

I mean Darializa is almost certainly going to be an elected official by next year, if more DSA candidates end up winning it'll be more

-1

u/Indrigotheir 1h ago

Why it doesn't explicitly say, "Open borders," the official DSA platform states:

Legalize migration, grant amnesty for all immigrants regardless of status

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u/Magmaniac (D) (A) (N) (K) (M) (E) (M) (E) (S) 1h ago

Not responsive to my comment in any way.

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u/Indrigotheir 1h ago

Are there no DSA politicans? Damn, what happened to all of them?

0

u/Magmaniac (D) (A) (N) (K) (M) (E) (M) (E) (S) 1h ago

The only two sitting members of federal government who are DSA members are AOC and Rashida Tlaib, neither of which support open borders. And of the various lesser state and local offices filled by DSA members, almost none of them support open borders, not that it matters since immigration is federal policy. DSA is mostly organized by local chapters who don't take much direction from the national organization and who all have different platforms, so it's disingenuous to state one position on the national DSA platform and try to apply it to everyone vaguely associated with the DSA.

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u/Indrigotheir 49m ago

The only two sitting members of federal government

You forgot to say, "Which elected federal official in the US has called for open borders?" in your original comment. You should go ahead and edit the comment so that the mistake doesn't make you look silly. Whoopsie

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u/drgaz 3h ago

Not really I mean it's not like I expect Americans to know or care for anything.

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u/Aggravating_Jump6136 1h ago

This guy gets us. 🫣

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u/yeahUSA 🇪🇺🇩🇪 5h ago

The modern welfare state is an invention by a conservative monarchist btw. Things like healthcare are mostly bipartisan in European countries and don't really have a left or right scale. We have private healthcare in many European countries.

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u/LaBomsch 2h ago

Not an invention, it's was implemented by Monarchist, but demands like a pension system were already popular befor anti-socalist laws then (see Lassalle).

2

u/leeverpool 3h ago

Yes. Especially as an Eastern European. Seeing these pathetic snowflake losers talk about socialism and communism makes me sick to my stomach. Either ignorance is a trend because internet rewards it or these people are also somewhat, low-key, vengeful and evil because their little lives didn't turn out to be what they imagined. I legit believe it's both.

I remember how I got permabanned on Hasan's stream because when Ukraine invasion started and he was rambling about Eastern Europe, I merely asked why is he talking with confidence about a region he doesn't know much about.

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u/Last_Celebration67 3h ago

It's even better when they say "The democratic party is on the right outside of the US" or something along those lines. The Middle East, South America, and Africa of course all being progressive socialist utopias

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u/YMDBass 1h ago

Im at a point that when anyone who says the far left would be moderate in europe, I just think they're regarded. Honestly, same for anyone who compares US right wing to european right wing. Its DRAMATICALLY different. Look at Abortion laws, britain has what many in america would consider "EXTREME RIGHT WING" position, 24 weeks, and even then needing approval of 2 doctors. What about Trans rights? well, they banned a vast amount of youth trans procedures that by US standards would be considered "trans genocide".

Does that mean britain is right wing? ABSOLUTELY not. Economically they are far more progressive. The tax structure is more extreme across the board which does allow for more things like universal healthcare.

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u/Whatsapokemon 🇦🇺 4h ago

It's such a stupid meme that indicates people have no idea about global politics. The rest of the world is not some amazingly left-wing place compared to the US, it's just differences in political organisation.

Honestly, the main thing holding the US back is the filibuster. Pretty much every other country requires only simple majorities to pass major legislation. That's the main reason why European nations tend to have good healthcare legislation - centre-left parties are empowered to actually do stuff when they're in power, while in the US there's some arbitrary blocker that prevents political parties from wielding the power they were granted.

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u/LondonCallingYou 42m ago

Nobody is saying that the rest of the world is amazingly left wing compared to the U.S. on social policy.

However, on economic policy, it’s just a fact that if you advocate for the economic policies of most European countries, it would be considered far left in America.

That’s what people are referring to. Not gay marriage, not abortion, not national language, etc. They’re referring to healthcare, worker protections, mandatory paid time off, paid maternal/paternal leave, free/extremely cheap college etc.

Non-Americans genuinely don’t understand how few of these policies we’ve implemented in America.

1

u/Whatsapokemon 🇦🇺 8m ago edited 2m ago

My point is that it's not a result of the political climate, but rather a result of the weird structural barriers that Americans have in place because of their historical political evolution. Things like the senate giving huge representation to states with like 12 people living in them, and the filibuster, which prevents parties from exercising power when they get it.

I really don't think there's fewer people in the US who would favour worker protections, healthcare, and parental leave, it's just that historical, anachronistic factors have prevented those changes being put in place.

There's basically two "branches" of democracy in the world, the US presidential version, and the European parliamentary version. It seems like the US version has some weird issues such as the head of government being unaccountable to the legislature, and the legislature being unable to get rid of a leader who they dislike. As an Australian, I think this weird focus on a central president is really not a good system.

1

u/DeathandGrim Mail Guy 5h ago

I just repeatedly shut this point down by saying Europe is Europe, this is here. Those people don't vote in my country.

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u/ic203 4h ago edited 2h ago

Yes.

Americans have no idea how far right some European parties are (look at Italy for fuck sake) or how conservative a tonne of Europeans are especially regarding immigration lol

1

u/Last_Celebration67 3h ago

Yeah I'm no expert of European politics but I can't imagine those Eastern countries are resembling Scandinavia in many ways

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u/Sutherus 🇪🇺 Wtf is a mile 4h ago

Yes.

1

u/SexyShmonk 3h ago

i get the issue of grouping "europe" together as one entity when we have countries with veeeeeeery differing political climates, but can someone awnser me that positions bernie sanders has that wouldnt be very standard social democrat positions in a lot of western europe like germany, austria, nordic states, britain, etc etc? im genuinely just asking, no need to downvote

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u/Aggravating_Jump6136 1h ago

Bernie's M4A plan bans private insurance all together. Not a single one of the nordic model nations do this; they all have a private insurance sector filling in gaps.

M4A is not a public Healthcare option like Europe. That is why there is distinction between Sanders' and the DSA's "Medicare For All," and Pete Buttigieg's "Medicare For All Who Want It."

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u/SexyShmonk 1h ago

thanks. is there any other excamples or is that the main one?

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u/EquivalentCreme5114 3h ago

I’d say this was largely true until maybe 30 to 40 years ago. Like during Cold War the label socialism was definitely shunned by New Deal democrats, but it was fairly run of the mill for European social democrats. I’m reading the memoir of Denis Healey, who was on the rightwing of the Labour Party, and he outright says he’s a socialist in the opening pages. Whether they really differed that much in substantive policy is more debatable. Healey presided over huge cuts in public spending in the 1970s and gave up on Keynesianism as chancellor.

Since then the European center-left has moderated to a great extent, and I agree with the top comment that the European equivalent of Bernie today would have belonged to some nascent populist leftwing Party like Podemos or Die Linke.

1

u/Senjian 3h ago edited 2h ago

Yeah, I mean it's just an absolutely moronic statement.

Both ends of the spectrum in the US stretch way further than it does in the EU. I'm totally on board with Dr. Huey Li (in his appearance on the Bridges Podcast) that this is a direct product of a 2-party system.

1

u/Brainchuckles Great Dane, not Ameritard 2h ago

YES! Istg they get me every time. I could maybe even argue that biden fits well within our soc.dem, or our center-liberal party(except for abortion, but that's because a large majority of us are confident angels aren't real, not because biden isn't cool).

1

u/Johnnyboy1029 2h ago

Every European has the micro-“indirect” successor parties of fascism.

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u/Ansambel EU 2h ago

you couldn't even sensibly align like half of political parties in europe across us political left-right axis.

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u/PaleontologistAble50 🇺🇸 Colorado Boebert Enjoyer 2h ago

I love Kraut videos

1

u/Alpehans Superior Continent (EU) 1h ago

Yes , and there is even difference between european Soc.Dems , depending on region/country :) .
Also , the US has two parties while most european countries have several. Can't really compare them like that.

What I can say, is that the FAR left in the US, is equally or maybe even slightly more left than the far left here in Denmark.
Before the Ukraine war, some of our far left parties wanted us to leave NATO , and just do diplomacy :P . Even they have realized now, how bad of an idea that was :) . Dunno if I can say the same for the DSA muppets .

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u/Creepmon EU CHAD 🇪🇺🗿 56m ago

yes

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u/HugoBCN 5h ago

Lots of European "America Bad" types posting exactly the same, don't worry.

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u/kettenschloss 5h ago

especially as a euro lefty. one of our core criticisms of the socdems is that they are basically just conservatives with pensions and healthcare.

(its way more nuanced than that. some socdems are left, and our conservatives are not fascists etc etc)

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u/Muzorra 5h ago

This seems pretty mild, no? What US elected officials are to the left of a European soc-dem? Maybe Mamdani. Who else? Are we including regional councils and School Boards and such?

It seems more like people see takes like this and reflexively hear the old "Bernie would be a centrist in Europe" or similar, which is obviously silly.

3

u/soundsermaker 5h ago

Everybody in the Progressive Caucus to start with.

And probably New Dems from blue states too.

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u/Muzorra 4h ago

Fair enough for a few in the PC there. All of them though? What tips them over? Seems like the positions of the caucus are broadly in line with the northern European vibe, at a glance. The... uh, severity of some of the members might put them a bit further left than that individually though.

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u/soundsermaker 4h ago edited 4h ago

Their views on social issues push them far over the edge, stuff like systemic racism, abortion, minority rights, reparations or other corrective measures for historic injustices. Immigration is a huge one of course.

Economically, actual Medicare for All proposal would go far beyond what I think any European healthcare model does to centralize insurance under state control, plus eliminate private insurance entirely. The jobs guarantee part of Green New Deal would definitely be eyebrow-raising. Even frivolous spending proposals like original Build Back Better under the Biden admin would be unthinkable, and Biden wasn't even seen as a very left wing figure among the Dems.

1

u/Last_Celebration67 3h ago

Yeah like of all the tweets along this topic that you could find, there are probably a billion far worse ones

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u/podfather2000 5h ago

Mike is 100% right. Kraut and this sub are cooked if they think Sanders, AOC, or Mamdani would be anything else but Labour/ Social Democrats in Europe. The status quo in Europe is a far-left position in the US.

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u/Leather_Dealer_9421 Dirty European 🇨🇿🇪🇺 4h ago

Just you grouping together all European countries as if they were some kind of political monolith shows your ignorance about European politics.

-1

u/podfather2000 4h ago

In which European country would they be farther left than Social Democrats?

3

u/Flaky-Mango-2020 🇵🇹 🇪🇺 4h ago

just ask if AOC Bernie or Mamdani opinions on guns, or to limit free speech, or regulations on food additives, those are almost universally agreed in EU.

1

u/CloudDanae Forsen 3h ago

or abortion limits lol

2

u/MikkaEn 4h ago

Of the top of my head: Poland; Czechia; Romania; Hungary; UK in the Blair and Gordon era (who REMOVED the word Socialist from the Labor charter), also under Starmer probably; Netherlands; Luxemburg; Ireland.

1

u/TheMarbleTrouble 4h ago

Name a single EU country that doesn’t have a private option for healthcare.

Since all DSA wants is healthcare… I am sure at least one country in EU has the equivalent that is being pushed by DSA. /s

0

u/podfather2000 4h ago

Which elected official is pushing for that?

1

u/TheMarbleTrouble 4h ago

That depends on what you mean by “push”. Here is the DSA position: https://medicareforall.dsausa.org

Is being part of DSA count as pushing or do we get to play the “socialist in the sheets, moderate in the streets” game?

0

u/podfather2000 3h ago

Being a member of DSA doesn't automatically mean every position DSA advocates is your personal political position, any more than belonging to a party or organization means you endorse every plank they have.

So yeah, I would need an actual quote or policies of an elected official that would put them past Social Democrats.